In the Mountains, The Dreams (A Cerce Stormbringer Story) Part 3.

Part 2

-

Chapter 4

Cerce fought to open her eyes. There was pain there, but she couldn't remember why. She raised a hand to rub away the sleep. Her mind felt muddled, like she'd awoken in the middle of a dream. She tried to remember. She felt that it might have been something scary, or something cold, but it was gone now. 

Sunlight was streaming through the window, warm, and Cerce wondered why she hadn't been awoken for breakfast. Sitting up, she looked down at herself. The tiny wooden bed in the corner of the big room, so much smaller than the other big bed across the room. 

Yawning, she stood from her little bed and stretched out. Her nightshirt was so long it almost touched the floor around her feet. The wooden floorboards of the bedroom had a reassuring feel to them, the curves and uneven surfaces so familiar, so distinct. She knew every tiny knot in the old wood. She trod it carefully, touching each board with her toes as she stepped across the floor and headed towards the small staircase in the corner.

She was forgetting something. Cerce stopped. Back again, the dream seemed to come close. She had the horrible feeling that she'd forgotten something important, a friend left behind. Of course! She quickly hurried back to her bed and searched in the sheets for him. 

Cerce retrieved the little cloth doll and hugged him close. The stitched on face smiled back at her. With him dangling from a hand, Cerce proceeded down to the kitchen. 

It was warm down there, smells and light filled Cerce's senses. The big old ceramic oven dominated the room, always lit and filling the house with reassuring warmth. There was food cooking, the smell of freshly baked bread. 

Standing, so tall, with her gleaming white hair bright in the morning sun, was a woman. Cerce could see her deft hands chopping at vegetables on the wooden countertop. Cerce skipped forward to hug her legs, and the woman turned, bright loving eyes looking down. Cerce cried out in joy. 

-

"Mommy...." Cerce whispered. 

Her voice was cracking and faint, and she proceeded to cough dust and blood out. Her chest pounded with pain and she blinked her eyes open. There was no way to tell if they were open or closed. Or maybe if she was blind. She knew she'd said something but couldn't remember what it was. 

She breathed in and coughed again. The air was stale, cold like the grave, chilling her lungs. Her lips were chapped and cracking, coated in dust. 

Cerce fought to remember where she was. Her head swam with thoughts. A scream, a face just like her own. A mix of relief and fear. Revulsion and recognition.

She'd fallen, she was certain of that much. Her left leg pulsed with pain, and she ran a hand down it to search for injury. It hurt, and there was a deep ache in the meat of her thigh, but she couldn't feel breaks or blood, so considered herself lucky. 

Fighting to her feet, Cerce reached out, hands waving in the darkness for purchase. It was so silent she could hear her heartbeat in her ears. Vertigo twisted her senses as she took a hesitant step forward, shifting her feet over the stone beneath them. She felt like she'd dropped far into the Earth, but had no concept of how far she'd gone, or how much further there may still be to fall.

The mountain. She'd fallen down into the mountain below the monastery. She brushed at her body, still feeling the places where hands had snatched at her, tore at clothing, ripped out hair.

She knew she'd forgotten something important. She held her breath and listened. 

Absolutely nothing, no sound found her ears, and Cerce sighed. Wherever Adam was, it wasn't close. 

She dropped to a crouch, and swept her hands around the floor. There wasn't much chance, but she had to try. The stone was smooth and cold and old, and she felt her way around the curves and lines and shapes of them. Feeling the shape of them gave her a sudden strangely nostalgic wave, like she'd done it before. She whispered, urging her hands to come across the familiar shaft of her halberd, but there was nothing.

Instead, she stood and decided to move forward. She searched for a breeze, for a sense of direction, but there was nothing. Just the ground beneath her and a feeling of emptiness. She knew she must be below the earth, deep in the cold mountain, but the strange semi-lucidity that was insistently pulling at Cerce's senses kept telling her the opposite. She tried to focus, slow her breathing, slow her pulse. Cerce knew her body was resistant to poisons, whatever affliction blighted the air she would acclimate fast. She just had to get through it. 

Every moment she allowed her mind to wander from focus, it slipped into strange places. The feeling that she was not confined continually washed over her, as if the darkness around her extended off into an impossibly huge space. 

The feeling of size and empty space was suddenly terrifying, and Cerce fought to calm her breathing. The blackness was so complete that her eyes began to fool her, and she imagined staring eyes the size of mountains glinting at her, perceiving the edges and vague shapes of things moving in the darkness bigger than the world. 

The sensation sent her tumbling forward, the hugeness of it impossible to grasp. Her hands found the ground and she fought to protect her limbs. Claws scratched on the cold stone, and the feeling of material came to her fingertips.

-

Cerce rubbed the soft material of her mothers skirts in her little fingers. She felt the reassuring tussle of her choppy hair as her mother reached down. 

Looking up into those deep blue eyes, Cerce had the strangest feeling. Like she hadn't been here in so long. It made her eyes fill with tears immediately. Her mother's voice came then, like chiming bells. The very sound of it knocked the breath from the little girl. 

She cried then, and was lifted up into her mother's arms. The welling, awful feeling of childhood impotency filled her, unable to articulate or explain. She hadn't the knowledge she needed, she didn't know the right words to use to make anyone understand what she was feeling. 

Her mother just held her, and bounced her in those arms, and cooed small reassurances in her ear. 

Soon, Cerce was placed down on the ground again. The wood of the kitchen floor warm beneath her bare feet. The house was so small, but to Cerce it loomed large. The wooden table, just a touch too high to see on top of without standing on her tiptoes, the old shelves filled with jars and books. 

The many containers on the shelves always fascinated Cerce, the multitude of coloured glass jars, ceramic pots sealed with wax or muslin. When cooking, her mother would reach for them, taking them clinking from the shelves and pulling a herb, unguent, or a glitter of spice from one. Cerce used to watch, like watching a wizard work, as her mother created magic. The musical sound of the jars clinking together would echo through the house, and as Cerce reached up to touch one of the little glass jars, they were so cold.

-

The feeling of cold glass was under Cerce's fingertips, and she gripped onto it, searching for anything in the darkness. A row of bottles, maybe. How long had she been on her knees? She wasn't sure all of a sudden.

One object tipped over and rolled aside, the empty glass ringing as it moved across the stone floor. She shook her head, her blurry thoughts making it hard to focus on any of her senses. She sniffed at one of the bottles, momentarily confused that they were empty. Having no idea what she'd expected to be in one, she placed it back down and warily rising, continued her way forward. 

Cerce turned, glancing over her shoulder. She wracked her brain again, knowing someone was just with her, a reassuring presence whose absence left her feeling so suddenly alone. She shook her head, and let out a cough, just to hear something. The noise echoed, coming back to Cerce and breaking the spell of emptiness the place held around her. It was a room, and she could find her way out. 

Treading carefully, her hands outstretched, Cerce moved on. If nothing else, the cold down here would kill fastest. Sapping strength and chilling the bone. Cerce could feel her joints stiffening from the cold, intermingling with the ache of bruises from the fall until she couldn't tell which ended where. Her lungs hurt from breathing the frigid air, and Cerce let out a growl, half of frustration, half to convince herself that her terror wasn't real. 

Just when the hopelessness of the dark threatened to overwhelm her again, Cerce's boots scuffed against rough ground. Just for a moment, but something was there. She dropped to a crouch and slid her hands across the stones, and her fingers found it. Jagged grooves, harsh on the fingertips and occasionally sharp. A far cry from the smooth edges of the ancient stone, Cerce realized what she was feeling. 

Crawling on all fours, Cerce followed the scratches as they continued, trailing a way through the black labyrinth following in whatever great object had been dragged there. The stones were hard on her knees, and the exertion of movement coupled with the excitement of making progress was making Cerce breathe faster. At the back of her throat there was a taste, a faint aroma that Cerce couldn't put her finger on. Somewhere between lavender and rot, and as she scratched along on the cold stone, it grew stronger. It was so hard to tell, she wanted it so desperately, but Cerce swore a breeze was bringing the smell to her. She continued crawling. 

It seemed an age there in the dark, the stones continuing on endlessly, following the scratches, the occasional brush of a wall, the sense of shape in the dark.

Cerce cursed loudly as her head bumped into something hard. Her claws found firm, worked edges. The heavy weight of the object having dragged scratches across the floor halfway through this place. As she slowly stood, her fingertips found meticulously fine carvings, delicate shapes. It was when Cerce found the breasts that she realized she was touching a life sized statue of a human figure. Reaching out, Cerce could tell the figure stood a few feet higher than her, both arms broken at the shoulder. She was about to move on before she gave a cry of satisfaction, finding the sconce at the statue's back. Her hands found purchase and she pulled the heavy wooden torch from it. 

The cloth wrapped around its end was hard and chilled, but seemed dry. Cerce fumbled at her belt for the pouch containing her tinderbox, the same little kit she'd had since she was a kid hammering away at things in her father's forge. She dropped to a crouch, shielding her work against the statue's side, claws working with practiced precision to get the kit producing sparks. It gave her a warm feeling, somewhere deep inside, to be reminded of her father. 

Varten had given Cerce the kit in the forge one evening. She could remember the sweat on his bald head reflecting the glow of the forge as he guided her slender hands in his great calloused mitts. A whiff of smoke caught Cerce's nostrils, and she stared down at it, the new light painful to her eyes as deep in the folds of the rag, flames began to burn.

-

Cerce felt her mothers hand on her shoulder, a reassuring squeeze as she looked into the fire of the little hearth. The house was small, and the ceilings low, so it warmed fast. Soon the fire was blazing, logs crackling away, and Cerce sat cross legged before it, watching the wood curve and twist. The warm orange glow filled the room, bathing it in deep shadow. Cerce looked back over her shoulder and watched her shadow fill the wall behind her and giggled. 

It was safe there, toasty in the room. Cerce looked back to where her mother stood, tending a boiling pot. Slowly, she circled her spoon in the concoction, before raising it to her mouth and testing the broth. Seeing Cerce peering up at her, she gave a wink and a secret little smile. Then, there was a knock on the door, a familiar, rhythmic knock. The same one he always used. Cerce sprung to her feet and scampered to the door to meet him.

- 

Cerce found she was staring into the flame atop the torch, the heat on her face soothing the freezing chill that had chapped her lips and left her nose numb. She blinked, staring into the flame. Something had roused her attention, a noise. The darkness around her was deeper now in light of the blaze atop the torch, and Cerce raised the torch in front of her, and almost jerked back in shock as a face was immediately revealed.

The stone features of the statue peered back at Cerce, a tall and beautiful figure. She was draped in a gown, the same soft white stone as her flesh, every curve and wrinkle of the material so delicate it almost moved. Cerce felt compelled to reach out to touch it, and found that sure enough, the statue and her garments were unmoving, unchanging stone. The flicker of her torch on the features gave a movement to the statue that was oddly unnerving, but somehow still comforting, not to feel so alone in this place.

As she looked up at the face, its sad smile sightlessly staring forward, Cerce became aware she wasn't looking at a rendition of a human figure. The ears were pointed, but not with the elegant curved helix of Elven anatomy. The lips were wide, coming out across the cheeks in a smooth bow. Cerce shook her head, finding it difficult to believe what she was seeing. 

She reached up to touch the face, to run fingertips down the cheekbones and across the lips. Imperceptible lines of familiar anatomy were here reflected with as much care and craft as had been devoted to the fine filigree of the gown she wore. In all her years, Cerce had never seen a statue of a Nadyr.  

It was a strange feeling, to look up at the face, and an overwhelming feeling of melancholy washed over Cerce as she did. Peering up at a face like her own gave her a sudden feeling of loss that sat in her chest, formless and directionless. Cerce found herself angry that the statue had been dragged down here, and was taken with the sudden urge to find a way to rescue it, to bring it back out into the sun. 

There was a noise, an echoing knock somewhere far above, that brought Cerce from her thoughts and back into the room. Raising the torch high, she realized the room had an open ceiling, a huge circular gap. Echoes of noise travelled down it from above, metal on metal, the distinctive murmur of voices. Chanting. A shrill voice cut through the darkness above the others, and Cerce found herself brushing her hair out the way as it blew into her face to listen. She realized that the ghost of a breeze blowing around her was coming from below, not with the voices from above. 

Following the stare of the statue, Cerce found herself gazing down into the depths of a great void in the floor. Her feet only a step from the edge, she was taken with a sudden swagger of vertigo, and stepped back to steady herself against the statue. Leaning, she found the breeze was coming up from the pit, a chill wind that was bringing with it the scent that seemed to permeate the whole floor. 

Extending her torch out before her, Cerce was met with a blackness so complete it gave a rise of horror in her gut, and the edges of her vision fooled her into imagining something rising from the black void below. The flames of her torch were bright, and the hole in the ceiling was well illuminated, the perfectly smooth sides leaving no hope for a handhold or a way to ascend. Below though, it seemed the light was hesitant to reveal what lay below Cerce's feet, and she took a step back, taken with the sudden dread impression that her light was slowly retreating from the darkness. It was impossible to tell how far through into the mountain the fistular pit cut, but Cerce would have believed in that moment that it went on forever. 

Far up from above in the loftier halls of the monastery, there was a cry. A yell of protest, of pain. Cerce grit her teeth. With the torch held blazing before her into the blackened hall, she strode forward, steady at first, her boots thudding against the stones. Seeking any way up through the bowels of the monastery, Cerce began to run.

-

Cerce's bare feet padded across the dirt ground of the thoroughfare and she giggled as she ran. The boy from the butcher shop was just ahead, his quick little feet darting. He looked over his shoulder, eyes wide, lips spread in a grin, and he gave a yelp somewhere between surprise and hilarity when he saw how fast Cerce was gaining on him. His laughter made him almost trip, and Cerce snatched at the back of his grubby brown shirt. She jabbed her little fingers into his side, eliciting a squeak of surprise. Cerce darted on by him, leaving him to sit in the street laughing. He pointed frantically in the direction ahead, and Cerce darted onwards. The butcher's boy couldn't play anymore, he was dead now after all. 

Thundering through the street, off the dirt road that threads through the town and onto the wooden planks that border past the stores and shops, she ran. Darting under the sign for the smithy, the next child was small enough to pass, her filthy blonde mop of hair brushing the hanging metalworking tools. Cerce came after, almost stumbling and falling as she did so. She thrust a hand out to steady herself against the wall of the little smithy. So cold, the wall was, somehow.

Quickly regaining the trail, Cerce darted again after her quarry. Furious laughter and a scatter of tiny feet alerted her where to go, and the chase began again. 

One by one she caught them as she ran, the imagined blade darting into bellies, throats. They fell, laughing to the ground as the green skinned girl continued onwards, chasing her friends down. Some days Cerce was the one running, the one hiding, hands clamped over her mouth desperately trying not to giggle, but not today. Today she was the huntress, and she was always the best at it. The sun rose into view at the end of the street, momentarily filling the world with light as Cerce ran.  

The boy whose father kept the livery was the fastest. Older than the other children, his legs were long and he ran beside horses most of his days. Cerce saw him dart around a corner, trying to escape, but she was quicker. Running to cut him off, she threw herself around the stony exterior of the old inn, the one that smelled weird. Stumbling and almost skinning her knees on the uneven stones of the building, Cerce crossed the door and out into the alley beyond, straight into the path of her quarry.

He tumbled into her, his heavy form bowling Cerce over, but she was fast, grappling at him until they crashed to the ground together. He struggled to escape, twisting at her little hands as she snatched for purchase. As he turned, his neck twisted before her face, the curve of his pale flesh stretched out before her. Somewhere, deep inside her head, there was a throb. A deep seated imperative, an instinct. The muscles at the back of her jaw twitched involuntarily, and Cerce let the boy go.

As he ran through the dust, making his way to the winning mark, Cerce rubbed her jaw. It ached. Her hands ached too, her knuckles. She looked down at them.

-

Cerce's knuckles were covered in blood. She felt splatters of it on her face, on her eyelashes. Her hands were raw and painful. At her feet, the monk gave a splutter through broken teeth. She looked down at him. His dark eyes stared up at her, and he shakily raised a hard to ward off further attack.

His other hand still gripped the improvised weapon, and Cerce stared at it in confusion for a moment. The monk dropped it, the heavy censer clanging to the stone to echo throughout the thin hallway. There was a pain in Cerce's jaw, a tensed muscle, one she hadn't used in a long time. It took her a moment to find the will to relax it. 

Behind her, steps leading down to the lower levels were spotted with blood, and the body of another monk was barely visible in the gloom, limbs splayed down the stairs, body still.  

Stepping over the quivering form of the monk as he burbled out pleas, Cerce continued down the hallway. Somewhere she'd lost her torch, she couldn't remember where, but the hall was dotted with lit wall sconces now.

The figures in the dark came for her again. Monks wielding staves, simple wooden staffs, one bare handed and screaming. The first Cerce tripped hard with a shove to his chest, her boot neatly stepping behind his own bare foot and bringing him down hard, his head cracking against the stone. The second raised his weapon in both hands, brandishing the stave as though it were a spear to run the advancing Nadyr through. Cerce made a faux leap, darting forward, and when he flinched backward, shot her claws forward to snatch him up by the collar. Hurling the monk into his oncoming comrade, Cerce brought her boot swinging hard into the sides of the men as they fumbled on the ground for footing. A second time, and the pair were sent tumbling, crying out in pain. 

The last monk that Cerce passed simply slunk to his knees, crying out in words meaningless to Cerce's ears. His palms raised up to her as if in supplication. She stared into his eyes as she strode past him, and immediately he fell prostrate, tears beginning to fall.

She moved without thinking, her feet pounding the stone, her arms rising to block the clumsy assaults of the monks that swarmed upon her. She lashed out with elbows, breaking noses, shattering teeth. Her knees met groins, guts. Her arms turned the swings of metal sconces, chunks of stone, bare clawing hands. Some monks came yelling at her, their voices sometimes seeming close, sometimes seeming like they echoed from afar. Some came in silence, in fear, like ghosts in the darkness that shied from her light. Cerce's eyes would focus, her strides finding stability and her senses drawing her ever onward, then the next moment she would seem to float, lost in reverie, the labyrinthine halls twisting nonsensically. 

Cerce had absolutely no idea how long she had been navigating the cold halls of the monastery. Time seemed to make no impact here. Grasping desperately to hold tight to her thoughts whenever they came clearly, Cerce breathed deep of the chill air. It smelled of stone and ice, incense and unguents. Occasionally a smell would waft past her nostrils. A strange scent, indeterminate and effervescent, that threatened to pull her after it, seeking an origin. She would find herself thinking of a bakery, a fish shop, remembering woodwork, fragments of faces that she could not place but that seemed so real. They teased her, alighting on the edge of memory and on the tip of the tongue, then gone again in a moment. 

Stumbling out of a stairwell and onto a flat plateau, Cerce shook herself clear of the enshrouding scent. It was becoming easier to pull herself out of the strange sensation, quicker to gather her wits. She could feel her senses becoming sharper, her thoughts ordering quicker. Her pace increased, boots thundering down the hall as she headed in the only direction she could, towards the sound.

Chapter 5

It had been only a muttered rumble at first, somewhere beyond the walls, but soon Cerce had come to recognize the sharply sang words of prayer. The strangely accented voice of Leece coming from somewhere in the darkness, raised above the clamour of the monks as they searched for her, moved through the tunnels, and above cries that Cerce was only now recognizing as those of children. The closer she came, she more she could identify the shrill voices. They carried through the darkness, reaching her and pulling her forward. A robed figure almost ran into her as Cerce turned the next corner and, flipping him fully with her own weight onto his back, Cerce stepped over him into a suddenly open space. The oppressive walls seemed to give way, and she found herself looking out onto a wide black empty space.

There were glowing red spots in the dim light now, monks carrying lit bundles. Cerce couldn't make out what they were, but they swayed back and forth among a small throng of robed figures, white smoke pouring from them, acrid stench filling the room. Here and there she saw smaller figures, some held by the shoulders, some gripped fully in the arms of the monks. The sounds of children's tears burbled under the chanting.

In the center of the room opened the great yawning pit, travelling down, down into the darkness below, and Cerce realized she come fully up the spiral to the source of the sermon. Across the pit, among the figures that swayed rapturous in his hold, stood Leece. At his feet, knelt bound before the pit, Adam murmured senselessly into a ragged gag. In the Nadyr monks arms, cradled across his body like some strange infant, was Cerce's halberd. His features were hard to make out in the dim light, but it was clear there was no strain in his face, no gritted teeth, no hunched shoulders. Leece was holding the halberd as if it truly were no more than the steel it appeared to be.

Seeing the polearm in the hands of Leece, wielded as light in his hands as any city guardsman resting on his laurels, flooded Cerce with a rush of confused jealousy. His hands slid down the shaft, fingers coiling around Cerce's weapon delicately. The thing may be a curse, but it was her constant companion, it was her burden and hers alone. To see another holding it like only she should have been able to gave her an awful sinking feeling of abandonment. Cerce was reminded suddenly and intensely of one miserable day, years back, carrying an armful of ingots, sporting an aching cheek from where she'd been slapped for talking back. She'd passed by the bakery and saw her friends, her best friends, laughing in there, without her. 

Cerce's jaw tightened, her throat suddenly hot with the choke of tears and her lips peeled back. She wouldn't be abandoned again. 

She barely felt the impact of the monks throat on her fist, or the next as she slammed him into the ground, skull hitting the stone with a slap, as she strode towards Leece. He may have been able to lift the halberd, to hold it and handle it like any other weapon, but he wasn't trained with the use of it. Cerce recognized his clear unfamiliarity with the weapon immediately in the way he gripped it in unbalanced hands. 

Leece's face was lit with madness and excitement when he looked upon Cerce, his voice rising to a crescendo. Cerce couldn't hear his words, they were senseless to her ears. She stared at him a moment longer, halberd raised, swaying in front of the great yawning pit in the center of the room. The convocation crowded closer, bright spots in the dark 

Cerce leapt, clearing the hole in the floor with ease. As the pit yawned beneath her, a single moment of numbing chill like nothing she'd ever felt touched Cerce's flesh, and then was gone. She slammed into Adam, knocking him back from the lip. As she rose to her feet, Leece was in her face immediately, the halberd shaft thrust against her chest. 

Leece's words were in her ear as she struggled against him, the words sickly and promising, but senseless, in no tongue Cerce had ever heard. She thrust out a leg and followed it with a hip, knocking the monk back a step, and yelled for Adam's attention. This close, she could see the thief's eyes were watery red, rolling and focusing on nothing, he let out a moan of senseless despair. 

Cerce heard the heavy clang of the halberd hitting the stone at her feet and Leece leapt at her. With surprising strength Leece struggled against her, fingers finding grasp on her clothes, tugging at her hair. Pulled close, his endless hissing in her face, Cerce held him hard and tensed. Other hands gripped at her, grasping her legs, pulling down, falling about her like dead weight to the cold stone. 

Heat brushed Cerce in the face then, a flare of fiery glow, and she was caught full on in the face by one of the burning bundles emissions. The thick white smoke stuck in her nostrils, sweet in the back of her throat. She fought to stay present, to stay conscious of where she was, but she felt her mind wandering away. 

The chase. The pounding of feet on warm dirt streets. Laughing.

Cerce gave a roar of denial, her hands scratching the cold stone.

She leapt, grabbing her target. They rolled in the dirt. Laughing.

Cerce's ankles locked behind Leece's waist, and she dragged him down. In his arms, close, the monk struggled, Cerce could smell his flesh, the sweat of perspiration. The back of his neck twisting before her.

The throb came to her then, the awful familiar tension, the muscular twitch at the back of her jaw. Leece's eyes closed, and he leant into her arms, almost in submission. Cerce's jaw made a cracking sound that she felt rather than heard. 

It was automatic, instinctual, happening so fast Cerce didn't realize what had happened. 

Cerce became aware of a quieting in the monks, a swelling susurrus that spread away from her as the robed bodies cleared back. Her nostrils were full of the burning scent, and her mouth was filled with the metallic taste of blood. Cerce spat, and with it came the mangled chunk of Leece's vertebrae that had crunched between her teeth. She let his corpse slip to the floor.

Cerce stood, a circle forming around her by the monks. At her side, one of the burning bundles flared, and Cerce reached for it. The bundle was crunchy to the touch, hard like bark, and Cerce tossed it down into the pit. The glow faded into the darkness without a sound.

In silence, one by one the other monks who bore the burning burdens began following, throwing their smoking bundles into the great pit. 

Cerce was on her knees, untying Adam's gag when she realized the first of the monks had tossed themselves into the pit too. She heard only the slip and momentary flap of robes, no scream, and the figure was gone. 

She clutched Adam to her, his coughing face spluttering for breath, as she watched more of the monks fall. Cerce's heart leapt in horror, until she realized the monks were not dragging their captives with them. The children were standing alone, some in tears, some staring in silence as the monks dropped into the pit. One by one they went. 

Soon only one remained. The last of the figures stood over Cerce, her face wet with fresh tears. She stooped, muttering words of thanks over and over, and touched her fingertips into the puddle of blood that leaked from the shattered neck of Brother Leece. She anointed her brow with crimson, and smiled. With another rushed prayer of thanks, she too was gone into the pit, and Cerce was left with nothing but Adam's heaving breaths and the quiet fussing of the children. 

She leaned forward, thinking to catch a glimpse of something, deep down in the pit. For all that had entered, there was nothing. It extended only down into blackness, forever. 

-

Adam was aware of the cool mountain air on his face, and licked his cold lips. He couldn't remember how he'd got there, outside again. His thoughts were a muddle of confusion, of sudden terror and darkness. He jerked forward, and found himself supported by his friend. Cerce held him up, an arm around his shoulder as he shuffled through the opening in the massive monastery door. The light was blinding. 

"What... what did I do?" he said, his tongue feeling heavy, words coming out slurred. Cerce shushed him. There was a smile on her lips, and Adam noticed soon after, a great deal of blood. There was movement around him, and he looked down to see the top of the heads of children. Cerce was shooing them out the door, and they went, two by two, hands clutching small garments around them, shivering against the cold outside. They stared as they left the darkness of the monastery, looking up into the white skies above. Adam put one foot in front of the other, his head lolling against Cerce's shoulder. 

Sniffling, shuffling, and one child skipping, the little procession travelled through the courtyard, and into the forest beyond.

Epilogue

Adam watched Cerce as she slung her heavy cloak over her head and folded the hood into place around her hair. She was standing in the street, her gaze unfocused, lost in thought as she fussed with the clasp. 

Adam exhaled a breath that seemed to be bringing with it less of a cloud, and looked out down the mountain path that would eventually take them home. Both of them were warm from the meal they'd been served in the tavern, from the brandy one of the children's mothers had brought, from the aromatic rolled cigarettes another's father had handed them. On her back was a satchel of supplies, rolled packages of pastries, breads. A few coins clinked in Adam's pockets, gifts from the people, a tiny amount to add to the paltry sum Willam had produced from the town coffers. They had been offered beds to stay in as long as they liked, but Adam had pressed them to move on after a single exhausted night. The town needed to heal, and besides that, sleep had come rough to the both of them, and they had swiftly agreed that putting some distance between themselves and the monastery would be the best cure for it.

There were spots of water on the ground, icicles growing long and translucent, dripping down from the awnings of buildings and the trees. Looking up to the pale skies, Adam thought that if you were generous, you could even say the sun might shine sometime soon. 

There was a great sigh of contentment from behind him, and Adam turned around to see Willam Black beaming at him as he walked to stand with Adam on the little wooden porch. 

"Not what you expect, is she?" Willam said, shaking his head. He folded his hands across his chest and continued looking out at Cerce. Adam watched the man from the corner of his eye.

"What were you expecting?" Adam asked. Willam gave a noncommittal huff. 

"Oh, I don't know. Not quite so friendly, maybe. Not quite so... pleasant? Agreeable? You know. You imagine something fearsome, when you hear talk of Nadyr."

"And when do you hear talk of them eh? Not many people even ever seen one," Adam said. Willam's smile faltered, before he gave a chuff of a laugh and looked away.

"It's rare, actually, to meet one. Could consider yourself lucky, even. If I were you I'd considered myself damn lucky," Adam continued. He turned as he talked, his hand resting on the curved basket of his rapier. 

"Quite..." Willam said, quietly. Adam nodded his head towards Cerce who was nodding and accepting a bundle of something in the street from a sobbing mother. 

"To be able to just call upon her, the Nadyr hero, from all the way up here, ask for her by name even, you must have had your heart set. Didn't even send out any other missives I'll bet, no other help needed. You knew just who you wanted." Adam smiled, a glint in his eye. Willam stared back at him. 

Slowly, the big man shook his head once. In spite of the chill, there was a bead of sweat on his forehead that wobbled slowly down his brow. 

"I did what I had to do, Serra. There was no...The children," he began, his voice breaking. Adam turned fully to him.

"I know. We do what we gotta do," Adam said. He slung he satchel up higher on his back, and then reached to place a hand on Willam's shoulder. A light grip at first.

"Look at her, you look at her and think about how lucky you are, yeah?" Adam whispered, his grip on the fat of Willam's shoulder tightening, "And you think how bloody lucky you are that I don't spit you like a pig for serving her up like that."

Willam gave a single nod, his jowls wobbling, red rimming the white of his blinking eyes, "I didn't have any other choice." 

Adam nodded, his hand lifted from the man's shoulder.

"We all do what we got to do, Black. Cerce would say there's nothing else for it."

The man stared after him as Adam left the porch to walk towards Cerce. As she Nadyr turned, she gave the thief a smile. It was a half smile, framed in a bruise and draped in fatigue and something else that Willam Black couldn't pinpoint. He continued to watch as the Stormbringer and the thief left, boots crunching on the wet street, people of his town calling after them, shouting their names. 

Willam watched them, and then he spat into the street before him, and turned away.

-

As always, it was a long road home. Adam felt the warmth on his face, blissfully returning as they descended the mountain. Every step away from the monastery seemed to be easing the lingering chill that gripped his guts. 

He glanced back over his shoulder to look for Cerce, who trod a dozen steps behind. Her tread quieter than usual, the heavy head of her halberd swinging in her grip. 

"What's got you so quiet, Slither?" Adam asked. 

Cerce looked up, her azure eyes taking in the grey light and reflecting clouds. 

"There was a statue...way down, back in the monastery..." She opened her mouth to say something more, then seemed to reconsider, chewing on her lip. 

Adam turned back, in time to avoid dunking his already soaked boots in another puddle, and soon enough heard the heavy footsteps of the Stormbringer striding up to keep pace. 

"Where do you come from?" she asked. She was looking ahead, down the mountain, and Adam did the same.

"Me? All over the place really. I say the Foul Mouth but, I was around before that. No idea where we were when I was born. I remember this hallway. Little and dark and stone, with a step, and window at the end, cat sleeping on the edge right by it. Don't know where it was now, no one left to ask."

Cerce was silent, staring ahead. Adam could see the hesitation on her face out the corner of his eye.

"You did what you had to do, mate."

"I know..."

"Nothing else for it," they said, almost in unison. Cerce gave a bark of laughter, and gave a slap at Adam's coat. After a moment she cleared her throat and spoke.

"I don't know where I'm from... honestly. I can say Belerion, earliest thing I remember, but it's not where I'm from. Varten sure as shit was my old man, taught me everything I know, but he was human. Who am I?" Cerce shrugged, her free hand reaching out, trying to make a gesture, something to help her articulate what she was trying to say.

"I don't know where I came from. I never got told. I never pushed it. I don't know anyone else like me. I get confused about the simplest things. The only other one like me I've seen, ever...I-"

"No one cares where you're from, Cerce. Not a single bloody soul," Adam said, "And nothing some creepy bastard in a cold church on a mountain could have told you is going to make a difference about that. But what people do think, is 'Fuck me, there goes Cerce Stormbringer. She's amazing. I heard she single handedly ended the battle of Belerion field with the lightening that blasts from her halberd. And that she felled the last Earthkin that rose from the ground in Baldhun Vale. Astride a raging Kelpie. Naked.'" 

Cerce gave a snort and smiled.

"I've heard that one too! I've never even been to Baldhun!" 

"What I'm saying is I don't care where you're from either, Cerce. I know who you are now."

Cerce gave a shy smile, her fangs showing.

"Thankyou."

They strode together through the forest, light dappling the floor through the trees above. 

"Helps the bards to have some mysterious gaps to fill at least. No-one needs to know everything. Bloody Carnaby was born on a pig farm." 

Cerce laughed, reaching into the bundle in her pack and taking a bite of soft grey cheese wrapped in nettles. Adam watched as a bird landed on a nearby tree, flicking moisture from its wings.

High above, in the town of Ancreed, the people told tales. 

Give me a Hill to Stand On

It took an event of some significance to rouse Morethek’s attention from their work.

The endless pages of knowledge that the adept was tasked to painstakingly translate and transcribe required flawless attention, immaculate accuracy, and the most delicate of hands. Hours, often days, would pass at a time before Morethek found cause to look up from their work. 

So it was that the red folds of the adept’s robe did not so much as shuffle when Berlewen returned from her errand with a thud of the great library doors, and came striding down the aisle between shelves, boots sending echoing clicks through the immense room. 

Arriving at her assigned place opposite Morethek, Berlewen placed her new texts down on the table across from her fellow scribe. Morethek absently waited for the sound of the adept taking her place, for their work to resume. 

The sound did not come. Berlewen continued to stand in barely contained silence above her station. Finally, it was impossible for Morethek not to send a brief glance across the table at her. 

Berlewen returned the look from beneath her cowl, her expression contemplative. Morethek’s face was partially obscured by the workings of their implanted eye, but the slow raise of one eyebrow spoke lengths in curiosity from the usually stoic adept. 

‘News, sister?’ Morethek asked. One mechanical hand folded a completed text closed, immediately reaching for the next. 

Berlewen breathed out, as if steeling herself for what she was to announce. 

‘The Fabricator-General has declared for the Warmaster.’ 

Morethek held the next text in stillness. 

‘Possibility for error?’ 

Berlewen pulled her seat out, and swiftly slipped into it, excitement touching her voice. 

‘None. Confirmed accurate.’ 

There was a moment of silence then, as Morethek attempted to resume their work. Text opened, eyes darting. 

Among the most diligently skilled of all Mechanicum adepts, Morethek was not familiar with distraction. It seemed now though that the information before them was blurry, meaningless. Morethek looked up from their work once more. 

‘This choice will mean war. This will lead to destruction.’ 

‘All freedoms are bought with blood, this was inevitable.’ 

Morethak’s cybernetic implant whirred, searching their companion’s expression. 

‘Sister, the Emperor brought us order, and structure and so, so much more. He is absolute, to deny him is nonsensical.’ 

Berlewen frowned, confused. 

‘No… no, you mistake order for control, you’ve been lied to my friend, like so many others. His chains are not hung for us to climb higher on, they are to bind us lower in place. Allowing him and those like him to shit on us from ever greater heights. This war will mean freedom for all of us.’ 

Morethak placed their hands on the table before them, the meticulous work upon it forgotten.

‘That is purely conjecture, supposition. I do not deal in opinions or conjecture, sister. I deal in knowledge, and knowledge is absolute.’ 

‘And knowledge is what the Warmaster will bring us! The shackles will be removed, our access to information unseen, the secrets of ages, ours! He will allow us to open the vaults, Morethek.’

‘Knowledge is hidden for a reason, sister, for a multitude of reasons. Until it can be examined appropriately, all facets considered, that kind of power will cause more harm than good.’ 

‘They gave many reasons that true knowledge was hidden from us, none of them satisfactory,’ Berlewen tapped a metal finger down upon the table, ‘Nothing should be kept from us. Nothing.’

‘Untethered access is chaos,’ Morethak whispered, and Berlewen rolled her eyes. 

‘They have their claws into you, again! Chaos is nothing but a word used by those who seek to keep us restrained. It’s fear-mongering. Order is a gilded cage, it may shine but rest assured we are trapped within it nonetheless. Horus will break us free, give us access to everything. True knowledge. True power. Ours to use as we see fit.’ 

‘That is treason, sister.’ 

‘No, refusing that call is treason. Obeying an unjust law is, in itself, unjust. Refusing the call to that freedom is inexcusable.’ 

‘You are speaking in idealism. I took an oath, sister. I took an oath to cherish the information we unearth. To hold such secrets above flesh, above life. To value understanding at any cost.’ 

‘I took the same oath. It spoke of seeking that knowledge at all costs. To never allow our pursuit to be interrupted. Thus will the totality of our knowledge grow.’ 

‘The safeguarding of information is a cause I would die for, sister.’ 

‘And I would kill in the pursuit of it.’ 

There was silence between the two of them for a moment, as each looked at their fellow adept. After a while, Morethak reached for their text, to continue the painstaking work. 

‘We have indulged our debate too long, most enlightened sister.’ 

‘It is good to share our voice at times, most celebrated colleague, thus is our knowledge shared and our understanding increased.’ 

‘I honor the Omnissiah in all things.’ 

‘I honor the Omnissiah in all things.’ 

Each returned to their task, pages turning, script flowing. Many times in the hours to come, Morethak found the urge to look up from the tireless work at their fellow adept. Each time, they found Berlewen’s gaze staring back.

Sleepless Night

Koshka awoke suddenly, the quiet darkness of the room around her was a small comfort to her thumping heart. There was a chill in the air, and looking up from her bed to the open window, she watched the delicate curtains dance in the breeze. 

Slowly, she rose from her covers. Sweat was hot on her skin, and she threw the bedclothes aside to try and settle her thoughts. Though the quiet bustle of noise from the late night streets of Waterdeep outside was as reassuring as ever, Koshka couldn't seem to the shake the troubling feeling of having just awoken from a nightmare. Letting the chill night air cool her body, she knew there was no getting back to sleep again tonight. 

Slipping from the bed, Koshka donned her robe. A flighty thing of black chiffon and feathers with more use as a prop than an actual garment, and silently crossed to her door. Her hand hesitated on the handle before twisting. This had become something of a ritual of late, as Koshka, knowing full well that it was madness but still compelled to do so, would stop to quietly ensure herself that when opened, the door would reveal only the quiet landing of the tavern she knew, and not the shadowed, windowless halls of the other place she had seen. She exhaled, and opened the door.

The tavern living quarter was pleasant at night. Koshka almost floated through the wooden halls. Floorboards gave a slight creak as her bare feet trod familiar pathways. Her hair was undone, hanging a mess about her shoulders, her eyes red and puffy from another night of troubled sleep. Her bare body beneath the thin robe had none of the usual vibrant ruby luster, just the colour of old blood in the dark. She let her hand rest on the wooden rail as she descended towards the main tavern floor, running fingertips across well known curves and cracks in the pine. She'd spent the last few days feeling like something had been taken from her, and any attempt to think back to the source gave her a feeling of dread that left her feeling continually distracted and disturbed.

The tavern itself was dimly lit, a candle burning on the bartop, and the tinkle of sound from the street outside barely passing the heavy walls. There was a shift of movement in the gloom, and it gave Koshka a start as she stepped forward, before she recognized the small form of Lilmaia crouched atop one of the bar stools. 

Wearing a simple dirty white smock a few sizes too large, the Goblin was busily eating a platter of cheese, gnawing on the heavy red rind of a particularly large block of edam. Her wide eyes reflected light in the dark as her gaze darted to Koshka, and she bared her pointed teeth in a smile. 

"Koshka!" the goblin chirped through a mouthful, dropping to sit on the stool, her legs kicking. 

"You're up late Lilmaia..." Koshka said as she stepped into the darkness of the quiet tavern. Lilmaia gave an energetic shake of her head. 

"Tomorrow's the day Elf comes in to count food. So today's day I eat a bunch in the night so have extra get here sooner." 

"Of course... you have to keep a schedule in business after all," the Tiefling sighed, the baffling discrepancies between supply costs and sales suddenly making much more sense. 

Lilmaia nodded and responded with a muffled 'mmhmm' around a heel of crusty bread.

Koshka looked over at the far corner of the tavern floor, at the raised area and it's wide cushions where she performed her shows. Her instrument was resting against the wall, upright on its langot, the delicate silver pegs glinting in the meagre light. Koshka had first seen it among the wares of a Gnome trader in the market, and immediately thought it the most breathtaking instrument in the world. Before that she'd played dulcimer, fiddle, and mandolin, but all of a sudden none of those had come close. 

Koshka had stolen it that night, obviously. She'd spent agonizing months trying to learn to play it by ear, until finally a silver-tongued spice dealer from Aglarond had offered Koshka real lessons on the instrument in exchange for nine nights in her bed. Three years later, Koshka saw the Gnome merchant again. She'd slipped four gold into his pocket using her trademark bump and lift maneuver. Only after that had the instrument felt truly hers.  

Koshka realized it had been a long time since she'd held it in her arms. Never before had so much happened in such a short period of time. She'd slacked in her practices. For a moment she found she missed the simple quiet of her old home terribly. 

A sharp little claw poked Koshka in the side and she turned with a yelp to find Lilmaia sat, feet swinging, on the closest bar stool.

"Can't wear that dress outside, people'll get mad," Lilmaia chirped, chewing on a hunk of gouda. The Tiefling glanced down at herself absently and gestured down at the expensive translucent garment.

"Oh, well this is a nightdress, you don't wear it outside. It actually quite a fine piece of material, I got it from an Sea Elf designer who..."

"It's stupid, not even half a dress. You got ripped off Koshka," Lilmaia nodded matter-of-factly.

"You're probably right," she sighed, and snatched up a slice of bread as she sat down beside the Goblin, "You aren't supposed to eat cheese at night you know... gives you nightmares."

Lilmaia seemed to think on that for a moment, chewing on another mouthful, before giving a great shrug and waving the hunk of cheese in front of her. 

"Would rather eat cheese and get nightmares than not get to eat cheese at all," she said firmly.

Koshka exhaled, blowing whisps of hair out of her face. 

"Good way to live I suppose," she said. 

Lilmaia's gaze suddenly darted up, her wide eyes meeting Koshka's. 

"Why you scared of nightmares though?" she asked quickly. Koshka was briefly taken aback.

"I'm not scared of them... I just, I don't know. If there's one place I should feel safe it's in my own bed," she sighed. Lilmaia gave a great sigh and rolled her eyes.

"Nightmares can't hurt you! They just in here!" she reached out to prod Koshka in the forehead with a nail, "Can't hurt you in there. Just in head. Nothing can hurt you there."

Lilmaia went back to her food, before her eyes widened and she turned again to the Tiefling. 

"Oh! Unless someone GETS you while you're sleeping! That different," Lilmaia quickly mimed a brutal stabbing motion with the hunk of bread in her hand, "Then you're dead! Or if house falls on you while you're sleeping. You're dead then too. Lots of ways to die sleeping."

"Thanks Lilmaia," Koshka said wryly, "That helped a lot."

Lilmaia simply nodded.

Koshka watched the slow rise of dawn through the thick bottleglass green windows of the tavern, heard the insistent hum of the city coming back to life around it. She realized Patrick would be down for the morning chores soon, so darted back to her room for a proper change of clothes to spare giving the boy a startle.

Giving her hair the briefest of brushes, a quick polish to her horns, Koshka returned to the tavern and seated herself in the high corner. Reclining among the pillows, Koshka set white faerie lights to glowing with a thought. After a moment taking in the old smells of wood and beer and sweat, she took up her sitar. 

Somewhere in Between

Groves gave another great grunt, his arms straining, cheeks puffed out, as once more he desperately tried to lift the wheel. The massive thing seemed made of steel, and budged no more off the ground the first five times the old merchant had tried to lift it.

With a great cough and a tumble of skinny limbs, Groves let go and slumped to the ground. The cart gave a worrying tilt and he scrambled to try and jam the plank back under it. The last thing he needed was all his silks spilling out onto the dirt road.

Satisfied that gravity was kept at bay for the time being, Groves stared miserably down the road. Dusty, sun baked and thick with rocks, it was more than two days home, and still hours from the gates of Truronia. Groves had to hit the one stone among a thousand that would throw his wheel off. He'd never make the market now. 

Murrey gave a low honk, and Groves waved a hand at the scruffy donkey. 

"Aw shut it. Some help you are," he grumbled. Murrey gave a further splutter and turned to graze at the meager brown grass that grew sparingly all down the road. 

He'd expected the road to be well traveled, and when he'd first thrown the wheel and been tossed, quite by surprise, onto the dirt, he'd thought someone would be by in no time. But the hours had lingered on, and the sun had grown heavier, and not a soul walked the dusty road from the north country. 

-

Groves was staring up at the sun, his vision blurry, and his tongue dry. He'd brought enough water for the trip, but not for this. He would have had something left to eat if he'd not made sport of throwing the wife's awful scones at birds along the trip.

He took a swig of the last waterskin he had left, and shook it. It was getting troublingly low. 

"What do you think, Murrey?" he asked the donkey, looking over to where the beast sat panting in the sun, "Shall we make a walk of it?" 

He could barely stand, his body was so weak. His arms and legs ached from the strain of lifting. His arse ached from the tumbled from his seat. His nose was scorched red from the sun. Groves finally admitted to himself it was lose all the silks and stagger home a begger, or maybe not get home at all. 

"What would the wife say? Eh Murrey? If the sun doesn't kill us, she bloody will I tell you that for nothing," he gave a snort. When he spoke again, it was in a mockery of his wife's piping accent.

"Lost all his wares on the road he did, on that old cart acting a todger as usual. Got nothing left, had to eat the donkey for dinner."  

He smiled at the donkey, and the beasts dark eyes stared back. Groves gave a long sigh.

"You never had any sense of humour."

He looked up the road again, the evening light tricking him into wondering if he could see the shadow of great Truronia's walls on the horizon, but there was nothing. No guards, no soldiers, nothing.

He gave a cursory glance back the way he had come, and his head turned back suddenly when something caught his eye.

He thought it must be a mirage at first, some trick brought on by the sun. 

There was a figure coming down the road. Slow and steady.

The figure was strange, hard to make out at first, seeming to be nonsensical. The blurriness from the sun was making clear assessment difficult. It looked like they were wearing some sort of hat.

Groves watched, mesmerized, as the figure strode closer, slow and steady. 

Tall, and slender to the look of it, not bulky with clothing as far as Groves could tell, but blue all over. Gods, that blue. He'd silks from Zenance he'd sold for a small fortune not as blue as that. He'd have to see where the figure came by it. Some sort of hat was definitely going on there, a tall arrangement extending beyond the figure's head. Almost like horns. 

The figure was clearly female, Groves noticed. He'd made half a century out of watching for women in the marketplace, the way they walk, the shape of their hips. All these thing he'd notice. The curve of the body, the clear shape at chest, hips, it was a woman all right. Something on her thigh was reflecting the dying light, sparkling.

Soon enough, Groves mouth dropped open. The figure was coming closer, slow and steady. It wasn't a hat. They were horns, huge upright horns that pointed towards the great open sky. They extended up from a dark veil, concealing the figure's face. The blue material of the rest of the figure was smooth, not even material like. 

Groves gave a cough and a stunned mutter when he realized the figure was naked. Her skin the most vibrant icy blue he'd ever seen. He found himself staggering to his feet. Staring, he still couldn't believe what he was seeing.

She was a beauty. A figure molded as if from marble. Strong and elegant she strode, one shapely foot in front of the other. Her toes were a softer shade of purple, and they pointed delicately as she walked. Slow and steady. Glinting silver, clasped around her upper left thigh, a coil of metal. Almost like a garter. 

Groves was overcome with a strange dissonance of emotions. To stare at the figure, to take in those legs, the curve of the hips. A modest bosom that he'd have found worth a glance even clothed, swayed bare in the sun as she walked. It made him feel like a giddy child. 

At the same time, he felt a rush of adrenaline, apprehension, fear. What manner of woman walked nude, across miles of country, bearing a head of horns and skin blue as the western seas. 

Was this death? Was this how she comes for you? Groves found himself entertaining the idea, and momentarily glanced back, half expecting to see his own dead body laying there in the dirt. 

No figure lay at his feet, and Groves turned back to find the woman now only minutes away. Within shouting distance, even. There he stood, somewhere in between home and Truronia, somewhere in between standing and fleeing for his life.

The figure came to a stop, a few feet before him, and Groves stood staring, mouth agape. His brain ceased to function for a moment as he took her in. Her face was mostly concealed by a simple black veil that hung about her head, concealing any hair, with holes to allow the horns to sprout through. Only the lower part of her face was visible. A strong, aquiline jaw, with thin purple lips. A face that betrayed no emotion. 

Her eyes were not visible, and he immediately felt shame as hie glanced down at her icy blue body, at her breasts, the dark purple nipples. Her figure was strong, like he figured a warrior must look. The muscles of a worked abdomen reminded him of a youthful body deserted him some thirty years back. He looked between her legs for a moment, a mound of snow white curls inviting him to stare, and found himself looking up directly at where he eyes must be, trying to play it off, thankful that his sunburn concealed his blush. The purple lips did not move to show any displeasure at his apparent appraisal of her bare body.

"Good evening to you, ah, ma'am. Miss." he said, stuttering. His powerful, practiced merchants bark had escaped him, and he sounded like a meek child, "Are you...are you alright, miss?"

The woman looked at him for a moment, as far as Groves could tell, and her hands came to meet in front of her hips. Strong arms, the blue colour darkening purple as it reached her fingers.

"It's a beautiful evening, thankyou. It seems you're having trouble, good sir. Might I be of assistance?" 

Her voice was unexpected and Groves was taken aback. A firm and loud voice, used to speaking, but delicately pronounced, as if speaking to reassure, to calm. Her accent was lyrical, like folk from the old country, and Groves was filled with a wave of nostalgia. 

"Your wheel is broken, might I help?" she continued, and Groves realized he hadn't responded. He raised a hand to scratch his head and turned to the cart, tearing his eyes from her beauty with some difficulty. 

"Oh, yes! Yes, the wheel. Came off on a rock. Heading to Truronia, for...for market." 

"Market day is beautiful, so much to be thankful for, all around."

"Not much to be thankful for here though I tell you that for... been in the sun a long time."

"Nonsense," the woman said, and immediately stepped forward, Groves was taken aback at her approach, and suddenly became aware of the woman's obvious strength. She stopped just before him, her head a few inches above his own, but her horns towering higher, and her lips spread in a warm smile.

"We must be thankful for the trials, and the hardships, and the suffering, good sir. Every day." 

Without a further word, the naked figure dropped to a crouch before the cart. Her strong arms reached out for the wheel, and ran a finger down it, as if appraising the construction. 

"Each day we suffer is a blessing. Each ache, each strike, each burn of the sun on our flesh is a reminder of our physical form. That we can endure, we can feel. We can do so much."

Groves opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out. He leant to attempt to help, but the woman raised a single hand to him, stopping his movement. 

"Please, allow me to take this burden from you. If it please you."

Looking down at her, Groves gave a shrug.

"I may not be a big lad but I couldn't move it an inch, If you think you might have better luck, you're welcome to give it a try." 

The lips smiled again, and the veil dipped in a nod. 

"Thankyou." she said quietly. 

Groves watched as she moved to grab hold of the wheel, her naked body tensing. He watched as her powerful muscles bunched, her legs braced against the road, arms tightening as she took hold of the wheel. The clasp around her thigh, he saw now, was a delicate arrangement of crossing metal. Clasped so tight was it about her thigh, that as she moved, he knew it must be digging into her flesh. 

"May it please you," she said quietly, then gave a hiss of exertion. Her hips twisted, and with a cry, she lifted the wheel clean from the ground. For a moment, the weight of the great thing was fully supported by her, shoulders tensed, body shaking, teeth clenched hard. With a thrust of her whole figure, she brought the wheel forward, slotting onto the axle with a resonant clunk. 

With one last thump of her clenched fist against the wheel, she slumped to the ground. Groves watched, mouth trembling fighting for words. The woman sat down, seating herself, chest heaving with slow, deep breaths. 

She sat there like that for a moment, her head down on a raised knee. Under her breath, Groves heard her quiet prayer.

"For every pain, for every ache, for every drop of blood I am eternally, exquisitely thankful."

Slowly, she rose. 

"That was... incredible," Groves stuttered, "How did you do it?"

The figure gave the slightest of bows to him.

"No praise is necessary, good sir. You were kind enough to gift to me your pain and hardships. I am deeply grateful."

She extended a hand to him, and for a moment, Groves didn't know what to do. Slowly, he extended his own, allowing her to take it. When her fingertips touched his, they were cold. 

Delicately she bowed, leaning forward, to bring her lips to his palm. Her kiss was soft, and as chill as her touch. 

After she released his hand, he took it back, cradling it to his chest. The sensation of her kiss remained. 

"Who...who are you, please?" he asked. Returning to her pose, hands clasped in front of her hips, she nodded briefly.

"I am Sister Thekkla, if it please you. Of the sisterhood of the martyred one, in the service of our patron The Sundered Lord."

"Well... thanks to him he sent you my way. I could have died out here if you hadn't passed by."

He gestured to her, at her naked figure, and felt ashamed for doing so immediately, but couldn't conceal his interest.

"Why are you...well, you're naked, miss. I thought you were a vision when first I saw you stroll up." 

The head inclined again.

"Penance, good sir. For my transgressions must be punished, so that I may become wiser, stronger, and closer to Him."

"Penance? You're being punished? They just stick you in the stocks where I'm from, not send you out bare naked into the sun."

A ghost of a playful smile touched the purple lips.

"I disagreed with my most exalted mother superior regarding the construction of an awning. She deemed it sufficient to weather winter storms, I made claim otherwise," she hesitated briefly, before continuing, "Twice. The second time including a... choice of language ill fitting someone of my devotion."

"Ah... yeah I've been chewed out for telling my boss to go fuck himself too."

Thekkla laughed, a musical tinkling that was pleasant on the ears.

"Thusly, must I walk at precise pace to Truronia, to the church of the Lost Martyr, to receive a mark upon my back from the disciplinarian. At the exact correct pace, I should have been back before dawn."

"Through Truronia? Like that? You're not afraid you'll be... you know." he gestured down the street, at the specter of the great and luminous capital city.  

"I fear nothing, good sir. And there is no hardship that can be visited by man that my body would be unprepared to endure."

Groves exhaled, glancing again across her body. The curves of it, the cords of muscle, the beauty and strength of it. It was mesmerizing. If he could sell artwork of that body he'd pack in the silk trade altogether and be a rich man. 

Thekkla gave a bow then, a deep and gracious curtsy, her arms spreading out, before bringing her hands back to clasp over her heart.

"Be well upon your journey sir, enjoy the markets. And take pleasure in the hardships visited upon you. Should you ever again face hardship you cannot overcome, bring them to me at the monastery above Marazion Village. I will welcome you."

He stared, awestruck, wanting then deeply to find some hardship. 

"That I will, be sure of that."

Thekkla turned, and began walking back the way she had come, into the evening light. Slow and steady. 

"Truronia's that way though!" Groves blurted out, pointing down the street. 

Without turning, Thekkla stopped, and spoke.

"The pace to complete my penance is quite precise. Mother superior will know I have dawdled. I must return now, and begin anew. Be well, good sir."

With that, Thekkla strode down the dirt road, her bare feet stepping over sharp rocks. 

Groves watched after her for some time, until her naked flesh was just a pale ghost in the moonlight far in the distance. 

Tales from Solemn Vale: The Stack

Atop a grassy outcropping on the cliff edge overlooking the mostly submerged wreck of the Persephone, a strange structure protrudes from the ground. The old red brick chimney, commonly known as ‘The Stack’ around town, extends fifteen feet in the air above the rocky ground. The treacherous cliff path to get to it, as well as its distance from any roads or viewpoints, make The Stack a well known spot for teenage hangouts and underage drinking. The weathered red brick is covered in graffiti, and if one would climb to the top of the construction, they would peer down into nothing but darkness with no bottom in sight. 

Town records are vague as to what exactly the Stack was for, or what it must have been built to vent. Many claim it’s simply leftover from a never completed property, or all that remains of one.  

During the night the chalky brick of The Stack is oddly warm to the touch. People say it just absorbs the heat from the day gone by, but there are a few who claim to have seen smoke churning from The Stack in the dead of night, belching out from the bowels of the cliffs beneath its protruding exterior. Sea maps state no cavern extends below The Stack, with the chimney apparently just continuing straight into the ground. Put your ear to the grass though, and it’s almost like you can hear movement down there. Under the low sound of the waves, a low and churning rumble, like the gears of some ancient machine. 

Birds that fly directly over the stack have been seen to twist in flight, as if their sense of direction is suddenly compromised. They spiral from the skies, flapping wildly, to crash into the ground not far from the old chimney. Even sitting near the Stack itself has been known to bring a feeling of dysphoria, nothing a few drunken teenagers would notice at first, but too long around the Stack does more than make you feel strange. The longer spent by the Stack, and the churning becomes louder, in the air even without an ear to the ground, the sound becomes more complex, intricate, until the sound of cogs and gears and pistons can be heard. 

The sound of the infernal machine follows visitors to the Stack for some time. They feel it in their fingertips, in the ground beneath their feet. Those who’ve been to that old chimney too many times know that something is down there, beneath The Stack. They know that one of the darkest secrets of Solemn Vale is not born, but forged. 

She's a Rainbow

Koshka sighed, it had been a while since she'd thought of him. 

Really thought of him, anyway. Everyday, somewhere at the back of her mind she guessed she must think of him. But calling to mind his face, his voice. It was pleasant to be lost in memory.

"Go on girl, continue, please," encouraged Treave across the room. His little face peered out from around the canvas, his nose preceding the rest of him by some way, before he added, "but keep your chin up, no moving now!"

Koshka gave a cough and reclaimed her proper pose, her face tilted away to expose her neck and shoulders, staring up towards the corner of the tiny studio. Her arm was draped across her reclining body languidly, one knee coyly raised. 

"Well... I don't know what to say about him really. I suppose he was kind. Charming even," the ghost of a smile lit her lips, her fangs showing at the corners of her mouth, "Plenty of them are, of course. But him... he was different. You believe in love at first sight?"

Treave gave a theatrical sigh from behind his easel, and without leaning to look at Koshka to respond, "My dear I am an artist. A thousand times a day I fall in love with a sight." 

"Well then... you understand."

"Well go on then, tell the rest of the story," he said. Behind the easel Koshka could only see the feet of the diminutive artist balanced on his stool, and she heard the rattle of one brush being placed in the water pot and another retrieved.

"I spend a lot of time thinking... where was he from? Because he told me, I know he did. He lay there with me afterwards and he told me all sorts of things. What he'd seen on his travels, how beautiful Waterdeep was from the sea. That there was so much else to see out there. And he told me where he was from but... I just can't for the life of me remember."

"What do you remember?" came the calm and inquisitive voice of the gnome, and Koshka giggled.

"I remember his hair. It was black, and curly, I curled it around my fingers as he lay there. And his eyes, they were brown. Deep and dark and he looked right into you when he talked to you. I remember the exact size and shape of his... well, you get the idea. I remember so much, but not where he came from."

"And what happened?" 

Koshka chewed on her lip before she continued the story. It was so quiet in the room, the scratching of the brush on canvas. Dimly from outside the rom, the heartbeat bustle of Waterdeep noon could be heard.

"Well, I was laying there, on my bed, watching him dress. That nice sailors shirt, strapping on his belt, shiny silver bosuns whistle dangling from it. He came and pulled the covers back and looked at me, and said that I should come with him. Leave for adventure, on his boat."

Koshka studied the knots and whorls in the old wood boards in the ceiling, the tip of her tail fought the urge to twitch.

"So many say that, of course. 'Come with me! I'll leave the wife!' or 'Run away with me, I'll take you away from all this!'" Koshka smiled ruefully, and her white eyebrows tilted ever so slightly apart, "so I just laughed and said next time. He was still smiling at me when he left, and said he wished I'd change my mind. And I just lay there and thought for a while."

Koshka heard the cry of a merchant somewhere outside, the clack of boots in the streets. The creak of a cart going down the lane. 

"I dressed so fast I forgot to button my shirt properly. I remember running, through the alley down towards the dock. Knocked over old blind Albert who sells the shells at the corner by the fish market, I was running so fast."

Koshka listened to the slow brush strokes from behind the canvas for a moment, then:

"When I finally got to the right berth, it was empty. I watched it then, parting waves not too far out the harbour. Big ship it was, all deep dark wood, blazing white sails, a lion on them. The name he told me, The Bride of Brythony, on the back all in pretty gold letters. Up on the front, the figurehead was an Angel, wings and everything."

Koshka tail gave a flick, her attention returning slowly to the room around her. The smell of paint, her own heartbeat.

"I watched that ship until it was a dot on the horizon, and then until it was nothing. I never found out where it went, and it never came back to Waterdeep again. I... suppose I think about what might have happened if I'd been on it, quite a lot."

There was quiet in the room, and Koshka flicked her eyes aside to see Treave smiling at her. 

"Thankyou, dear girl. I always find it calms my models to chat, take their mind somewhere else."

As the gnome approached, Koshka raised one shapely eyebrow.

"Done so soon?" 

Treave gave a shrug.

"Not just yet, but in a foolish mistake I should have foreseen, I did run out of red paint. You're vibrant, you know."

"I've been told. Naturally catches the eye," Koshka said, rising from the low chaise lounge and its many pillows, and stretching. Treave looked up at the Tiefling and removed his tiny spectacles to clean them on his smock. 

"I do understand though, my girl," he said as Koshka bent over to begin retrieving her clothes, "Sometimes you only get one chance to capture something. I try my hardest to." 

He gestured his little arms around him. Although Treave was by far best known for his many portraits of the women of the realms relieved of the burden of any clothing, in between were curious sights captured in his colours. The light on wet cobblestones, gleaming fruit on market stalls, flapping sails at dawn. 

"There's many beautiful things in the city, Koshka," Treave said as he replaced his newly cleaned glasses, "It's a blessing when one of them lingers for more than just a moment."

Koshka smiled playfully down at the tiny figure, and placed her hands on her hips.

"You can't flatter yourself out of the models wages, by the way, little man." she said.

"Wouldn't dream of it, my dear."

Eighty-Seven Petals

The rain began to come down in the last day before Ness finally left the mountains behind, crossing the border into the forest edges. It was blissful on Ness' skin. The morning sun was still heavy behind her as she walked, her eyes watching the flats for any sign. It had been days since she'd seen the tracks in the dirt left behind by her quarry, but Ness had followed it this far, and knew it must have followed the same mountain pass. The rain would wipe her own light tracks clean, but the heavy hoof marks left when her quarry touched the ground were deep and unmistakable. 

Ness felt the relief of the softness beneath her feet as the rocky grounds finally gave way to at first sparse, but soon dense, grass. The seemingly endless stone walls and cliff edges of her journey had brought with them an oppressive weight to her search, and as she felt the grass between her toes for the first time in so long, Ness found herself dropping to her knees. She felt the rich dirt under her fingernails, breathed in the heady smell of fresh dew, and let her wide eyes gaze over the lush world in front of her, taking it all in again. 

For weeks in the mountains, stony grounds had hurt her feet and merciless suns had chapped at her naked flesh, but just the sight of the rich greenery of the forest ahead washed the aches away like a cool river, promising relief. Ness took in a deep breath, smelled the grass and the light scene of the little white flowers that peeked out from between the undergrowth, and rose to her feet once more. She wanted nothing more than to throw off her heavy satchel and roll in the grass, play with the birds, chase the bees that clumsily bumbled about the blooms, but she didn't have any time. Every moment she hesitated, she could be losing time. It had been a while since she had consulted the flame, and she was worried that she'd lost ground since then. 

The straps of her satchel pulled at Ness' tired shoulders, the bare skin rough where the heavy thing had hung about them for so long. She gave the worn straps a tug and pulled the satchel higher on her back. It was her burden to bear. She shook her head every so slightly, just to feel the reassuring weight of the jewel clipped in her hair, its red feathers waving, before she strode on. 

The forest was so thick by midday that the sun was hidden by the heavy foliage above. It came to dapple across the mossy forest floor, where Ness had stopped to drop into a little stream. Just for a moment, she told herself, just one moment of peace. Her satchel placed safely to the shore, Ness let the quietly warbling stream wash her free of the mountain dust. Her green skin shone in the rays of light from above. So long apart from home, the luminosity of Ness' skin had faded. She could barely even see the glow of her flesh in the night anymore. It made her sad, Ness felt like a part of her was fading away with it. She told herself, once again, that when all this was done, when she finally finished her quest, that she would be able to return home, and her flesh would gleam the moonlight shine of her folk again. 

As she stood beside the stream, letting the water run down off her body, Ness looked down at her marks. Purple against the green of her flesh, she let her fingertips trace a few. She didn't need to count, she knew there were eighty-six of the delicate petals marked onto her body. Dropping to a crouch, she opened the satchel. Her eyes searched the forest around her for movement as her fingers searched the pockets within. Every little flicker of movement in the dense undergrowth Ness noticed, the slow movement of a ladybird that made its lazy way up a vine nearby, the flicker of light on butterfly wings as a glorious blue specimen lighted onto a flower. Ness' fingers brushed the little orb, smooth surface cold among the other cluttered contents of the satchel, and found purchase on a tiny parcel wrapped in leaves. It was the last one she had left, but wouldn't keep much longer. 

Her fingertips teased aside the leaf and Ness chewed on the revealed morsel of honeybread quietly. The tips of her long pointed ears twitched, and her eyes darted across to where the rustle of noise had come from. Barely audible, the little deer had appeared across the way, drawn to the water. Its wide eyes stared at Ness for a moment, so still as she was, naked against the green of the forest, she was barely noticeable if it weren't for the delicate shine of her only garment, the gold bracers. The eyes of the deer met her own, and Ness smiled warmly. The creatures of the forest knew the folk and soon the deer relaxed, approaching the river to drink at her side. 

Ness crumbled the last corner of her bread onto a stone by the riverside as she rose to leave. Sliding the heavy satchel onto her back, she gave the deer a stroke as it came to nibble at the crumbs. Lighter on her feet than even the deer, Ness continued into the forest, telling her direction by the moss upon the trees. 

Ness had found the hoofprint at nightfall, not far from where she'd found the fallen bird. She knelt by it to look, and saw that it bore the usual marks. Neck broken suddenly and cruelly, drained not just of blood but of soul. The little body was cold, but the ground around it was freshly disturbed, flowers crushed. It hadn't been long. Ness stood, and darted forward through the green vines that draped from above. She felt the weight of the jewel bobbing in her hair as she ran, her bare feet padding the forest floor swiftly and soundlessly. Light was fading, and Ness' eyes fought to see the signs she searched for. 

The rain that had been so blissful before had obscured the way, and Ness crouched in the forest, her fingers desperately searching for marks. So close, she was so close and now she had lost it. She bit her lip. There was nothing else for it, she couldn't let it gain ground again, not after so long. She found shelter beneath a great fern looming over the forest floor, and knelt there in the darkness. From the bracer strapped to her forearm she pulled the little stick of incense. It had been so long at first, and had burned gloriously, it's blazing light so full of secrets and truths and clarity. Ness blew upon the blackened tip, and with a deep green glow, the little stick flared to life. 

The flame pulsed, glowing and rearing, not much larger than Ness' head as she held it, and the tiny figure that stretched out within the flame stared back at Ness, her eyes pleading. 

"Child...I have not much time left," the little figure said, her voice a hushed whisper. Once, the figure had stood seven feet tall, and her voice had boomed, echoing in the hills, her fire a blaze in the night.

"I'm so close, it's here, I have to stop it here, can you light the way?" Ness whispered to the figure in the flame. It seemed to flare smaller even as she watched. 

"Go child...run!" the figure hissed, and the flames flared up once more, before extinguishing in a flash that made Ness cover her eyes. For a moment, she was terrified that she'd burned it too long, before the forest floor beneath her lit with a burst of green fire, streaking off into the darkness of the glade at incredible speed. The fire lurched, seeming no to harm the grass all around it, and lit the way. Ness replaced the incense stick in her bracer, shorter now as it was after every time, and fumbled with the satchel, snatching the orb as quick as she could. Gripping the cool surface of it in her hand, Ness darted off to follow the flames. 

When the flames burned out it was all at once, dropping the forest into darkness in the blink of an eye. Ness came to a halt, her breath tight in her chest, her eyes darting, and her hands held still. For a moment there was nothing, the forest was empty of life, no insects chirped, no awakened birds flapped, there was only the sound of Ness breathing. She held it, let the silence cover her. Snatching the jewel from the clasp in her hair, she held it aside her head, close to her eye, staring into it as she slowly turned.

The red surface of the jewel reflected the forest so keenly it was uncanny, a perfect mirror reflection clearer than reality itself. Ness watched carefully, seeing her own face and the forest around her, seeking anything that wasn't visible to the naked eye. The slightest movement, the tiniest rustle of grass. 

Her ears twitched, and she turned towards the sound. There was nothing there to regular vision, but glancing back into the reflection of the jewelsight betrayed the huge form of the Nuckelavee as it surged towards her out of the blackness of the night. Ness fought the urge to scream as the beast barreled down upon her, gigantic limbs thrashing, glistening skinless flesh reflecting in the jewel. With her other hand, Ness raised the orb and flung it. 

The orb struck the beast in the forehead with unerring accuracy. There was a flash of light in the jewel, so bright it almost bled through into the real world, and the beast was gone. Ness realized she was still holding her breath, and let it go with a whoosh. 

The orb lay upon the forest floor, steaming as rain began to fall upon it. Ness hesitated to pick it up, anticipating the pain. This had been a bigger one than before, faster, seething with hate. Steeling herself, Ness reached out.

The pain was unbearable. All the hatred and anger and rage the Nuckelavee held, Ness felt it all. The resentment for all life, the unbearable hunger, Ness took it all within herself. She felt the mark burning itself onto her flesh. One more petal opening, blossoming on her body. Suddenly, it was over, she sighed. It was her burden. 

The rain came down in full then, soaking the forest. Ness stood in silence. Naked, and once more alone. Ness placed the orb back into the satchel. Its weight on her shoulders both tiring and reassuring. Delicately, she clipped the feathered jewel back into her hair, its weight further adding to the sense of security, of purpose. 

There was the briefest flicker in the ground at her feet, the last remnants of her guide. The fires flicked, directing her to look west. So it was then. Ness knew she had no time to rest. Her next quarry could be gaining ground even now. She began to walk. 

Ness did not need to count the petals on her body. She knew there were eighty-seven now. That meant there was only twelve more to go. 

-

Inspired by the Art of Tess Fowler.